


i will never live like you, but you will probably die like me

by RangerDew



Category: BNA: Brand New Animal (Anime)
Genre: Gen, Mental Health Issues, Minor Character Death, Violence, and hopefully metaphors and symbolism or whatever idk my brain is too huge for you guys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-13
Updated: 2020-06-13
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:27:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24706807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RangerDew/pseuds/RangerDew
Summary: the year is 1056 and lycurgus wants to die.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 41





	i will never live like you, but you will probably die like me

**Author's Note:**

> title from raised by wolves by voxtrot

the year is 1056 and lycurgus wants to die.

nothing looks right. the bits and pieces of beastmen litter the floor in broken parodies of their former selves, and endless stream of gore and flesh and blood. there are flames eating some of them. every building, every wall seems to have been torn to the floor. the sky is burning a deep, bright red. 

absentmindedly, lycurgus thinks of his grandparents. where are they now, among that tangled, inhuman mess? 

his grandparents hadn’t even recognized him, the last time they saw him. they’d circled on him like sick dogs, the blackness flaking and peeling off their skin. 

he can’t think. his heartbeat is paralyzing. 

lycurgus moves, step over step over dead beastman and broken rubble. he is faintly aware that his body should be on _fire_ right now; he must have scratches, or cuts or wounds. 

he just feels numb. the flames lick the sky, touch the heavens, pull them down to hell. 

he doesn’t know when he ends up in a clearing, but it’s not even a clearing anymore. gore looks to have been rained upon the field. there are bodies covering the ground, blood drenching it, and there’s not a bit of clean dirt in sight. lycurgus’ eyes stare it all in clear focus, but he can’t see. 

a goat, eyes on fire and body covered in soot, screams like nails against metal before she falls, and her body becomes indiscernible from the corpses around her. the flames begin to devour her corpse, too. 

lycurgus looks up to the sky as if asking for an answer. a flag and a general with a crested head fill his vision like a sign. they’re standing amongst the flames. taunting him. 

there’s a sprout on the flag. the human army had put a sprout on their flag to represent growth and potential.

lycurgus’ eyes swim and when he looks at it again, it’s a flag with a fountain spouting beastman blood.

his eardrums nearly split from the roaring. he doesn’t even feel the arrows as they pierce his body, the fire as it eats his soul, but the line of his neck burns, and burns, and burns.

_(and he burns, gods damn it, and he ravages through armies like a wild flame, he tears out necks and leaves entire fortresses devoid of life and full of blood, spouting it._

_in the end, no matter how much red streaks his teeth and fingertips, he cannot find the general. he seems to have vanished into thin air._ _)_

  
  
  


* * *

‘young man? young man!’

the wolf takes in a harsh breath at the sudden noise. he’s been having trouble breathing these days; there is never enough air. he tries to steady himself.

‘young man? can you hear me? what are you doing out here?’

the wolf does not answer; only attempts to take another breath. it sounds shaky and pathetic. 

there’s a pretty duck in a lake in the distance.

the voice (a merchant, a merchant, probably) scratches his head. ‘hum. well, what’s your name, young lad?’

it’s an unfortunate question, because he doesn’t have one. he’d lost his name the night he’d drowned himself in a sea of human blood, the taste of their throats fresh in his mouth. he’d lost his name among the fire and carnage and smoke and in the process, he’d lost himself, too. 

if he leaves this merchant waiting any longer, though, he’s sure he’ll leave, and he can’t let that happen (he’s a human, he has that stink on his clothes, the one that smells like sweat and wood and skin and the wolf doesn’t trust him, not at all, and he knows that there will be something that will show the wolf just how irredeemable and awful he is and he will tear into his throat like a saw but not now, not now.) he attempts to breath in once again. this time, it sounds slightly steadier. 

‘lycurgus,’ he says, because the person he used to be had a name. the word sounds forced and haggard from his mouth. he tries to take in another breath. 

the merchant scratches his head again. ‘lai-cu-gu-er-u-su,’ he says, a bit slowly and heavily accented. ‘a greek name, isn’t it? you don’t exactly look the part, though.’

_we can’t have you walking around with no name, can we? lycurgus is rather beautiful; a traveller told me about it just a couple weeks ago._

_that’s a bit of a mouthful, isn’t it? why not something traditional like 小白?_

_我亲爱的, a greek name would mean a higher chance of getting hired for a job outside nirvasyl. it will be good for him in the future, if he ever decides to leave._

_leave! now why would he ever do that?_

_sh! just a precaution, okay?_

‘my grandmother gave it to me,’ the wolf says. 

the merchant nods, like he’s just been imparted sagely wisdom. the duck in the distance preens its feathers. ripples are sent across the lake. the wolf takes this as a signal and tries to breath once more, but it chokes a little on his throat.  
  


‘so, lycurgus,’ the merchant interrupts, ‘where are you from?’

_don’t call me that._ it’s an irrational thought considering the wolf gave him the name in the first place, but he hates it. he hates being attributed with something that isn’t him. 

lycurgus screamed and swallowed blood as his head rolled amongst fallen beastmen. the wolf standing on the bridge in front of the merchant is something else. 

‘hey, ‘are you okay? you seem to be having trouble breathing.’

the wolf paws at the ground a little. he’s suffocating. ‘i’m injured,’ he says. ‘my lungs got crushed by a rock yesterday.’

(they weren’t. but he does remember a lake, a duck, and the way the bubbles flowed up after a skip and a step. not accidentally. he’d been trying to wash the fire from his memory.) 

the merchant’s voice snaps him out of his thoughts. ‘why don’t you come stay at my place, just for tonight? it’s a bit dangerous out here for a lone traveler like you. especially one so young — you look like you’re barely out of school.’

on the faraway lake, something startles the duck. hurriedly, it flaps its wings and takes off. 

the wolf suppresses a grunt of anger. he tries once more to inhale, but he can’t seem to let the air in. 

the merchant seems to have stopped listening to him entirely. he pats his donkey, once, twice (a donkey? how did the wolf not notice that before?) and they begin to pull the cart down the path. it rumbles lightly over the rocks, and a few of them fly over the cliff. the wolf watches them fall.

the merchant looks back, as if to say, _come on._ little pebbles. continue to stagger and roll over the edge. the wolf follows.

they walk in silence. the wolf tries to think about anything but breathing. 

suddenly, the merchant slips. ‘oh—’ is the last thing he says before he goes plummeting over the edge.

the wolf barely takes notice. he watches him go in silence. 

there’s a long moment of nothing.

the wolf turns to look at the donkey. the cart is still filled with goods. there’s a bag of what looks like a pile of coins peeking out of one of the drawers. 

he sighs, chokes on his own air in the process. then he goes and pats the donkey twice, guides it to keep moving. 

when they arrive at the village, silent and stoic, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out what happened. there are tears and mourning townspeople all around him. the woman who he presumes to be the wife is sobbing.

he can feel something pull at his heart uncomfortably and, in an effort to distract himself, tries to take a breath in. it comes out as a cough, and anger wells inside of him like a lit match. he clenches his paws.

a villager points at him in fear. then, they’re all looking. not a minute later and there are stones hitting his skin.

the match turns into an inferno.

he runs. 

* * *

‘mama! mama! 帮忙! xiao bao is not playing by the rules!’

he’s standing in a beastman village east somewhere. the air is clear and smells of wild grasses — it’s surprisingly calming. he tests it out; tries to take a deep breath. he manages to get some ways through it before a sharp panging fear stops him, and he breaths out again.

there’s a sheep beastman girl not far from where he’s standing, playfully trying to get her brother down from a tree. somewhere, the wolf registers that they are playing tag.

she turns and spots him, runs over. ‘mister! wanna play with us?’

he has no reason to refuse.

they run along the paths between the paddy fields, the summer breeze smelling like grasses and wind and nature. cicadas chirp as if cheering them on, and the sheep girl and boy screech with joy when the wolf scoops them both up in his arms in victory.

the sun is over halfway in the sky when they decide to take a break. the sheep girl’s brother has gone to bother some tadpoles, and the sheep girl and the wolf are sitting together. 

‘why doesn’t your brother ever chase?’ the wolf asks. it’s not even kind of conversational; it comes out as an apathetic, almost scathing remark. the girl barely takes notice. she scrunches up her nose.

‘he’s a weirdo!’ she proclaims. ‘it’d be no fun.’ she looks down and fiddles with her dress. ‘and also… he’s my little brother. i’m supposed to be the bigger one! i have to protect him, and it’d be weird if he was chasing me.’

the wolf plays with them for hours after that, until the sun is almost gone beneath the mountains and the sky is a brilliant orange. the mother, a homely ram, calls them and ushers them into the house, chiding them for spending so much of the day playing.

‘wouldn’t you like to stay the night? it’d be an honor,’ the mother says to him after they’ve gone to bed and quieted down. ‘i haven’t seen xiao hua have this much fun in ages.’

his heart is pounding and there’s a profound sense of _togetherness_ in him, he hasn’t smiled this much in what feels like ages. there’s a rushing fondness in his chest that he can’t name. 

he doesn’t want to indulge it. ‘but i’m a—’

‘wolf, don’t worry, it’s okay.’ she creases her eyes and whispers, as if imparting a secret. ‘i can sense kindness in beastmen.’

the wolf doesn’t know what to say. the mother ram smiles and opens the door to welcome him in. 

the next morning, the air smells like willow ashes and burnt fat. the wolf wakes up with a hole in his chest and tears in his eyes. 

it’s happening again. the wolf walks out of the bedroom, slowly, _step, step,_ and the air is suffocating him, just like years before, and suddenly he sees everything in perfect clarity. he throws open the curtain to the main bedroom and the sheep boy and the mother ram are both there, two twin spear wounds in their chests. 

the wolf lowers the curtain. his heart feels like it’s going to jump up and out of his throat. 

he turns almost desperately and steps into the living room. 

it’s been ravaged. tables are overturned, a vase is on the floor, and the sheep girl he’d just been chasing yesterday, who’d been laughing joyously and shrieking wildly at their exploits, is fallen by the door, knocked down. her blood pools and she looks like she’s drowning in it.

something that he thought dead kindles in his chest.

he can’t stop moving. he slowly walks and walks and walks until he reaches the front door, parts the curtain. 

the entire village is on fire and the sky burns bright, bright red.

his breathing turns heavier. there isn’t a single house left free from the carnage, all withering, all of them, and the paddy fields that they had worked for generations to cultivate were piles of burning black dust. the paths where he had chased the children beastmen just a day ago had been scorched.

it’s gone. all of it is gone, in just one night. flames lick the sky like they had not many years ago. 

he howls until he loses his voice. the fire may have swallowed him before that. 

* * *

there’s blood at his feet. he feels like he’s standing on top of the middle of the ocean. 

the red permeates his vision, and he’s suddenly wildly aware of the harshness of his breath, the tension in his fingers, the unending beating of his heart.

there are bodies all around him. humans, he’s sure. their throats have all been ripped clean. he distantly notes that some of them are clutching each other.

a terecean flag flies over him, slow and melancholic. the fountain is still spewing blood.

it doesn’t matter. none of it matters. he has failed to find the general, but no human death is unjust. a flame wars in his heart as he thinks this. yes, no human death is unjust. insatiable creatures, they are, and he had been given the holy duty of eradicating their stench.

_this is what you get,_ his mind howls, _for your crimes. for burning the paddy fields. for burning their homes. for taking the life of a little girl who wanted nothing more than to play tag and protect her brother._

_where would she be, had she lived? had the wolf stood guard that night?_

he breaths it in, the blood, the meat, the smoke. he doesn’t choke once. a drop of blood rolls down his hand and _drops_ into the sea beneath it, making barely a sound.

he is Death. 

* * *

it’s a smaller town this time, and not a beastmen one. Death takes a harsh breath in, sees the frost covering the trees, and realizes the first snow will be soon. he’s far west. he doesn’t know the specifics of his location; the language spoken here is confusing and garbled, though hears the word _szécsényi_ spoken more than once. he stands, raises his head. there’s not much for him to do right now, and he’s tired from traveling. he’ll rest.

there’s a sudden kind of _clatter_ from his right, and he whips his head around. there’s a woman, a human woman, hands clutching air and a pile of wood fallen on the ground. she looks like she’s seeing a ghost. or a monster. or a god.

‘i-istenem’, she says, fear evident in her voice, fear evident from her scent. Death takes a step closer. he doesn’t know why he even thought it would shut her up — she just shrieks louder in her gibberish. ‘ _farkas istenem!_ ’ she turns and runs back to her house, wood forgotten.

Death sighs. so much for seeing the clean first snow. his time in this village is up.

he stalks towards the house. he only hopes the red won’t taint the white later. 

* * *

a century— two?— have passed, with Death wandering around villages, towns, bustling ports. he stumbles upon several small and unsuccessful beastman towns and leaves each of them as quickly as when he came. he doesn’t care, he tells himself. he spends the rest of his time tearing down entire human armies, though he turns up fruitless, blood-covered, every single time.

there’s a smaller beastman village this time, much like the one he stumbled upon all those years ago _(the one he damned all those years ago),_ and he can see beastman children playing in the sun. 

he steers clear.

and he’s lazing in a shaded walkway _(the last man he murdered had his throat ripped out, yes, and blood spewed all over Death’s fur but it was so divine, the way he screamed, and the way the blood dripped and splattered and smelled like a king’s meal)_ when he sees a group of cloaked figures approach a young boar.

he turns to get a better look.

‘may you become a good beastman,’ one of the cloaked men says as his hands trail over the boar girl’s shoulders. he touches the her forehead, gingerly, like a father.

dazed, the boar girl leaves. the cloaked figures look at each other, nod, and clasp their hands in a prayer. 

‘may you become a good beastman,’ they all say, their voices dissonant and clattered, a hundred bowls breaking at once. the phrase reverberates in Death’s head.

_may you become a good beastman._

a spike of pain runs through his skull. he leaves the village the next day and never looks back.

* * *

‘have you heard of the legend of the wolf of zhongshan?’ 

‘no; i migrated from pingyao, i don’t think i’ve heard of such a legend.’

‘no? well, basically, there’s this wolf, right.’

‘i figured.’

‘no, no, listen— so there’s this hunter, right, uh, king jian zi, who’s hunting with his buddies in the mountains. they spot a wolf, and shoot at him, but miss and hit a rock. so the wolf escapes further up the mountain and comes across this mohist merchant, who, uh, i forgot his name, but the wolf implores him to help because of his beliefs, he believes in universal love—’

‘wait, this is sounding kind of unbelievable. mohist? what kind of merchant was he?’

‘i don’t know? but anyway, so this wolf wants his help because he believes in universal love, and so the merchant agrees. when king jian zi and his hunters come by the merchant later, he denies knowing anything and hides the wolf in his cart. and so they leave, the wolf comes out, and demands to eat the merchant. and then, without waiting for an answer, eats him anyway.’

‘hm.’

‘so the wolf steals the merchant’s donkey and cart and takes it down to the mountain back to the village. he transforms into a human so they don’t suspect anything, and tells everyone that the merchant is dead because of an accident, and that before he died he did everything he could. it’s a persuasive speech, and everyone cries, and then he marries the merchant’s wife. but she’s suspicious because he keeps going on long night hunts and eats all their food, so one night, she dresses up like a sheep and goes out into the woods. and she sees that her husband’s actually a wolf! she tells the village and the next morning they stone him to death.’’

‘what?’ 

‘what do you mean, “what”?’

‘i don’t get it. so the moral is to not kill people? and also, since when can wolves transform? it’s a bunch of horse manure.’

‘pah! aiya, are all peasants like this? don’t you know of the 野兽人? it’s best not to insult the wolf so, or he may transform into a human and come after you too!’

‘i have never heard of such a thing. beast men? are you mental? i don’t like this story. and anyway, i’ve got to go pee now.’

‘okay. want to come back and here another one later?’

‘sure. as long as it’s not about shapeshifting wolves.’

* * *

‘p-please!’ a rabbit beastman holds out her hands. they’re caked in dirt. ‘please, i have nothing left! spare me anything, and you’ll be greatly rewarded by the gods!’

‘what gods, girl?’ someone jeers. another person throws her a leaf. she looks like she’s about to nibble on it, but instead she carefully places it next to her and puts her hands out again.

Death stares at her for one suspended moment. she’s hunched over, scrawny-looking, pathetic, and yet still holding on to any scrap of hope that she’ll be given food, money, something. her back is completely straight, and there’s a kind of determination to the way she holds out her hands and bows. 

he doesn’t carry money with him, nor food. he pillages and hunts when he needs to. there’s nothing he can give this girl. 

he sighs, stops halfway; the air doesn’t come back into his lungs as easy as he likes. 

the rabbit beastman doesn’t look up as he steps towards her, but her ears twitch as a sign of acknowledgement. Death looms over her, waiting for her reaction. when it’s obvious she won’t speak, he begins.

‘don’t beg,’ he says. ‘nothing comes from begging. things come because you will them to change.’

the girl still does not move. he keeps going. ‘if you sit here for the rest of your life, you’ll waste away or starve. i’d hate to see that happen to a beastman.’

she’s still. Death watches her for a while. he makes a move to leave.

‘thanks, mister dog, but i don’t think i will.’

he turns sharply.

the rabbit girl’s head is still lowered, but she’s clearly speaking. ‘i see this is something you can’t be expected to know,’ she continues, ‘but there are just some places you cannot reach with hard work. you will try and try and try, and nothing will change. i know you know this, mister dog. so i hope you’ll forgive me if i beg for a while.’

Death stares. she hasn’t moved a muscle since he approached her.

a rage simmers in him, low and warm. _(there’s no way she could possibly understand.)_

he tries to take a breath in and fails. there’s nothing more for him to say.

* * *

he notices a lull in activity. the humans seem to have forgotten they exist.

it’s more peaceful in the villages he passes through. beastmen children laugh and smile unabashedly, never having seen the sight of blood.

he stops in a village on day, just to take in the sights of a (finally) happy, flourishing beastman community, when an old ox beastman walks up to him.

‘are you okay?’ he asks.

Death’s mouth feels dry and hoarse, but in his heart is flying. ‘of course,’ he says. ‘this is more okay than i’ve been in forever.’

the ox shifts a little. ‘i see,’ he says. ‘i was just concerned, sir, because you’re crying.’

Death’s hands fly up to his face. his fur is wet and matted. 

‘oh,’ he says.

the ox dips his head a little. ‘it’s peaceful, isn’t it?’ he says, voice low. ‘i’m an old one, and i can tell you it’s wonderful that it’s like this now. my father died before i was born, and my mother would regale me with tales of his brutal death every night before i went to sleep.’

Death whips his head over. ‘what?!’ 

the ox laughs. ‘don’t sound so shocked. you look like you’ve seen some things yourself. if you had a child, wouldn’t you warn them for the ages? “stay away from the humans.” that was always her message in the end. to the very end.’ 

he looks far off. there’s a sparkling in his eyes. ‘the paddy fields are beautiful today.’

* * *

terecea falls, and Death still feels like he is drowning. 

he’s slaughtered thousands of soldiers. he’s ravaged countless cities. and still, humans live on, and beastmen continue to die. 

slaughter won’t end his nightmares. slaughter won’t solve his grief. terecea was mortal. the general that ended his life was mortal. prejudice remained forever in the human consciousness. 

he’s immortal now, just like that prejudice. despite the revenge trips and deliriums and constant attempts to end his life this duty just may be why he was created. 

he’s empty, empty, empty and he can’t breath. the best thing he can do, the only thing he can do now, is help. 

he picks himself up. one of his legs are shattered and he groans with pain, and there’s still human blood, fresh on his fingertips. Death centers himself with his arms and one remaining leg and transforms back into human form in a flash of blinding light.

and he begins to trudge.

* * *

_(shirou’s eyes can only see fire.)_

* * *

The Beast Sport Act of 1483

The killing of any beast-man for sport will no longer prelude punishment. 

* * *

he’s standing on the sea again. 

_like the devil,_ the villagers cry. _like the messiah,_ his mind provides. he doesn’t remember who said that.

the floor is a brilliant deep crimson. Death’s teeth taste like iron and salt.

he hadn’t been planning to do this. he’d wanted to become a savior, a travelling god, helpful and kind and healing. he’d wanted to be… 

guilt claws in his stomach when the image of a beastman village, on fire and choked out of life, assaults his vision. 

it was those damned humans. they’d enacted a law that legalized the fair killings of beastmen. worse, the people had leaned into it for sport.

he’d never forgive them. a deer girl, big and strong, _big and strong?_ , was his memory playing tricks on him? had been speared a thousand times and shot by one of their canons.

overkill. it was overkill. Death was half afraid she’d turn out like him, but she lay their, body full of holes and head blasted to dust. it was disgusting. he’d thrown up on the humans’ bodies after he ripped their throats out.

for the first time, he wonders. why won’t they _see?_ why do they kill and mock and scorn instead of _see?_

they were so peaceful. so kind. no, it shouldn’t matter whether or not they were kind. they were people. 

Death raises his head to the sky.

he didn’t give up the name Death because he had murdered far too many to do so. and now, he won’t give up the name because he knows it’s what he is.

if any human dares beg for their life, his answer is this: i will not be kind. you’ve murdered all the kind ones. i am what’s left. 

* * *

_die, he’d roared at the human. the human had just laughed._

_Death picked him up and wrung him. when he puts him back down, the human is sputtering blood._

_‘why did you laugh?’ Death asks._

_the human, weak from the wounds, still manages to chuckle. ‘because,’ he says, ‘i am going to god. i am going to god for helping eradicate his earth of one more hideous beast.’_

_he dies the most painfully out of all of them. Death makes sure of it._

* * *

he wanders into a beastman village, teeth and mouth stained bright red. other beastmen subtly step off to the side. even with the town’s penchant for poverty and violence, they’re still scared of the large wolf lumbering through the area. 

well. not much else to do here. if he goes back west, there’d been rumors the terecean army would be marching out; for what reasons he didn’t know. he only knew they would not reach their destination.

as he steps into the outskirts of the town, he feels a pair of eyes on him. he turns. a beastman in a dark hood stares back at him. then, they dart off, disappearing behind a corner.

...whatever. it was probably just some random onlooker. there’s still red all over his teeth, after all. 

he’d better wash it off later. 

* * *

_(he hates his motherland. he hates the blood seeping through its bones and muscles and he hates the ignorant men that ravaged it and he cannot think about his grandparents without thinking of fire, all fire, just fire._

_if he does not die in this land, he must leave.)_

* * *

the boat rocks, and a few seasick travelers lean into their buckets to throw up. Death sits, perfectly still, amidst the smell of sickness and disease. 

‘oi, oi, have you heard the legend of the silver wolf god?’

‘don’t make up things! my head is sick enough…’

‘i’m not kidding! it’s a pretty famous legend in china, i’m surprised you haven’t heard of it.’

‘silver...银狼神? oh, i think my wife offhandedly mentioned him once. before she was murdered, anyway.’

Death breaths, in and out. tries to steady himself. 

‘way to bring down the mood, 哥. anyway, you speak it, too? i guess it really is beneficial to learn that language nowadays, trade and such’

‘you tell me. my brother almost named his kid ‘hua li’. then again, he lived in china for a good part of his life. i’ve never seen anyone else try to do that.’

‘yeah, because that’s weird. we’re not chinese, so why would we name our kids that way? it just seems like an excuse for the community to ostracize them,’

‘that’s what my sister told him. in the end, he gave his kid a traditional name. thank heavens, am i right?’

‘or thank the silver wolf god.’

Death breaths in sharply. nobody notices. 

‘what.’

‘he’s the god of beastmen, you know! been alive for a thousand years...’

‘no way! from what my wife said, he just sounds like a bloodthirsty loner looking for revenge. not all of us are like him.’

‘what’s that supposed to mean?’

‘i’m looking for a new life. you don’t see me going after every warlord who’s murdered a beastman. we’d have to get rid of all of them.’

Death moves to get up. 

‘geez. but the thing is, if the silver wolf god is real and immortal, he doesn’t have to worry about a life. he’s got all the time in the world.

‘hmm.’

and he slowly walks updeck. 

it’s mostly empty. a seaman is at work with some ropes, and birds fly overhead. Death does not think they are free. Death does not envy them. Death does not think of the duck, all those years back in the pond. Death does not think of drowning. 

updeck, the boat feels gentler, faster, and he leans over the side of the railing. the water trails, _fwshhhhhh,_ indefinitely. it doesn’t stop. it doesn’t stop. Death can’t stop looking.

_time,_ he thinks, though he has no idea why he thinks that. it’s true. he’s immortal, so he can give and give and give and never have to worry about living, not ever. the concept of ‘living’ requires an antithetical, does it not? eternal war is peace and eternal life is death. he will never get to live.

he should feel something at that. a profound sense of loss, because he was supposed to be a fisher with his family and spin clothes like his grandmother and help neighbors like his grandfather. he should be declining a request from a love-stricken girl, should be going on beast hunts and coming back home a hero because they eradicated a local threat. he should be settling down with someone he loved, someone he could respect and kiss under the moonlight like his grandfather did to his grandmother, should be settling down and raising kids, a girl who would protect her little brother at all costs and loved to play tag and she would be a sheep and _—_

he stops himself. 

_humans,_ he thinks. _that’s who took everything from you._

revenge, retribution, hope. 

anger boils in his stomach and his fur rises. he breaths. the anger simmers down, and he knows, he knows he will never be rid of this feeling as long as he lives. he breaths in the ocean air. it smells like salt and seaweed. 

it all leads back to this. this is his purpose. 

the boat only goes in one direction, anyway.

* * *

‘eh, a white wolf? i’ve never seen one before!’

‘mommy, can i touch him? his fur is so cool!’

‘sh! get back here, akiko!’

the beastmen town welcomes him in a language he does not understand. they take him into a humble little house _(お風呂、アキコを描きます！)_ and give him a place to bathe _(準備ができたら電話してください！)_ and to rest _(これがあなたの部屋。ええと、あなたは何語を話しますか？)_. Death has not been met with this much kindness in forever.

he kind of despises it. he’s uncomfortable in the bath at first. it’s clean, it’s all so clean, and he can already see the red from his body seeping into the bath, turning the water red, staining the wood, _blood, it’s a pool of blood, he’s going to bloody their peaceful rooms and peaceful homes and he should stay out of it because it’s disgusting how something like that could happen._

he bathes, anyway. the water is warm and soothing to his skin. 

the room he’s given is small and theres no bed, just a mat, but there’s a kind of burning in the chest when he sees the things set up for him.

he’s just staring at it, a bit stricken, when one of the people walk in. 

‘um…’ she’s some kind of racoon, and she looks small in his presence. ‘do you speak mainland?’

Death blinks, surprised. ‘yes,’ he says. ‘i do.’

the racoon (?) girl sighs a bit, steps forward. ‘um… i just want you to know, sorry for overwhelming you. not all the families in this area are this hospitable. kimiko-sama just lost her son a year back, and i think it’s opened up her heart a bit to the world.’

Death waits for her to continue.

‘eh, if i may ask… what’s your name?’

he doesn’t answer. he doesn’t know how to answer.

she shifts her feet a little, and a bit is beginning to open in Death’s stomach. ‘heh. this may be a bit presumptuous of me, even talking to you, but… are you the silver wolf god?’

Death doesn’t exactly know what comes over him. the next minute, he’s right in front of the racoon girl, standing over her like a predator ready to strike.

_(the fear in her eyes is probably exactly how beastmen look before they’re slaughtered by humans.)_

he flinches back. steps aside, slides between her and the door and flies out of the house faster than anyone could notice.

from now on, he’s done taking hospitality.

* * *

the next time he gets blood on his hands he is so, so tired.

there’d been a human village that had been recently very close to discovering a beastmen settlement nearby. he’d slaughtered all of them after some guards had run in and discovered he’d killed their leader.

it was a sloppy killing, on his part. and even sloppier, and sloppier, and sloppier. the whole village is gone now, and the fresh snow is drenched in blood.

it’s so hideous. his eyelids feel heavy and when they fall, just a bit, he sees the blood seeping into the soil, tangling in it, tainting it. 

he does not want to turn this land into his motherland. he does not want to do anything. 

_Terecea has fallen, terecea has fallen. and Death will never be happy again because he no longer feels a rush when he sinks his teeth into human veins, only a weariness in his bones as he limply grasps onto a neck, limply snaps it, limply rips it out._

_it’s so unfair. the humans killed and laughed and then they died and Death killed and laughed and lived and killed and laughed and lived and killed and stopped laughing._

_isn’t revenge supposed to be sweet?_

he no longer wants to stain the snow. 

he leaves.

* * *

_i will tell you what is too much, Death thinks. too much is the murder of villages of beastmen children. too much is the ravaging of entire villages, of entire livelihoods, for absolutely no reason. too much is the second-class status beastmen get, half-man, half-brute. too much is when you watch your city go up in flames, and an arrow pieces your body, and a sword pierces your neck. too much is_

_the look on that little girl’s face when she said she wanted to play tag._

* * *

  
  
  


_beastmen are crying. fire roars up to the heavens and they are hugging each other, and crying, and praying._

_suddenly, a howl. heads turn. a bright white wolf stands within the carnage, regal, god-like. it jumps down and kneels next to the villagers._

_they cheer while they climb upon its back. ginrou has saved them._

* * *

there are tears in his eyes when he sees beastmen children celebrate the tanabata festival with their parents. one little girl, in a beautiful kimono, is laughing with her grandmother.

he feels just a little more cleansed. 

maybe ‘protector of beastmen’ isn’t such a bad title after all. 

* * *

_(he hates remembering this bit, but rose barabarei’s description is surprisingly accurate. she describes it as so:_

_beastmen were being held in terrible conditions in cages. rose remembers that she barely had any food. one beastman came back to their cell screaming wildly. one of their arms had been grotesquely enlarged._

_she remembers the crying, the screaming, the men in uniforms pushing them, hurting them, changing them. she remembers a child with pitch-black hair and wide eyes, and she remembers never seeing him again._

_‘of course, i later figured out it was kuro,’ rose says to him. ‘crows can write. did you know that?’_

_everything smelled like vomit. near the end of the war the cages were nearly empty, but rose remembers that in the beginning, children were piled upon each other like livestock. ‘you could barely breath._

_‘and then, a white wolf in a noir detective getup shows up,’ she chuckles. ‘it’s a bit funny looking back, but i just remember my awe. it was so bewildering. nobody stood up to the humans, not anymore._

_‘ginrou had come to save us, some of them said.’_

_he’d transformed in a flash of white light. a large, godlike, shining silver wolf._

_‘and then you slaughtered them all,’ she says._

_it was true. he could still smell the blood if he tried._

_‘it’s not your fault, you know.’_

_it completely was. in the carnage, he can remember the crying of beastmen children. one of them had their arm ripped clean off._

_‘you don’t have to say that,’ he responds._

_rose chuckles. ‘but i do,’ she says, eyes softening. ‘you’d never believe it if i didn’t.’_

* * *

he’d killed them. he’d killed all of them.

his hands are drenched. his teeth are drenched. it’d been so long since he’d bathed in swathes of human blood. his breathing is harsh. _(it smells like salt and iron and salt and iron and salt and iron and blood—)_

there’s a loud crying that pierces his eardrums. he turns around, and a little beastman horse is covered in blood. there are lacerations all over his body, no doubt not there before. next to him, a leopard is missing his entire arm.

for the first time in a long time, he wants to throw up again. there’s water in lungs all of the sudden, and he feels like choking.

the blood on his body suddenly tastes very, very different. 

it’s a desperate blur after that, a drowning wolf running from his mistakes. he doesn’t know when he reaches a river, but he washes his hand, washes his face desperately. the water turns murky from his murder but his hands still feel _wrong_ somehow, cursed, damaged, sour, _trainted,_ and suddenly he wants no more than for them to be as far away from his body as possible. he tries to wash his mouth by drinking the river water but it just feels like he is piling more and more ocean atop himself, until the pressure is suffocating and he feels like he is at the bottom of the sea.

he turns around. he wants to shrivel up inside his skin and climb out, renewed. the field behind him is on fire.

he almost _sprints_ to one of the nearest flames, consuming a patch of dry grass, and he puts his hands over it _just for a bit, just until it burns off the bad bits—_

he screams. the night carries on without him.

\--

_it’s peaceful,_ he thinks, when he sees secluded beastmen villages where the sun shines and the children play.

he distantly hears of beastman rallies for equal rights. pride and shame wells up in his chest.

there’s no way he can go out to them now. and in today’s age, with cameras and transportation and technology becoming more common, well… 

it’s better he just remain a myth, right? 

(it’s better to not let them down with the real thing.)

* * *

‘ginrou,’ she says.

‘how did you track me down,’ he asks, blunt, angered. the sphinx cat beastman in front of him is unfamiliar and foreign.

she holds up her hand; a placating gesture. ‘i’ve been following up on you for a while,’ she says. ‘i had to do some research on ginrou sightings on the web. of course, having seen the real thing, it wasn’t hard to figure out which claims were fakes and which claims weren’t.’

‘how do you know me?’ he continues, because nobody has ever actually _found_ him like this before, not since the war, and this _stranger_ should not know him unless _—_

‘you saved me,’ she says. ‘from the camps.’

‘you shouldn’t be speaking to me right now.’ he has to go.

‘no, listen _—’_ he tries to turn and she grabs his arm. he stares down at her in shock, tries to pull _—_

‘i’m building a city where beastman can thrive and be themselves. i need your help.’

he stops. she loosens her grip. 

‘please listen,’ she says.

he’s unmoving for a good minute. this means _—_ this has _—_ in today’s age _—_

‘speak,’ he says.

and so rose begins. ‘i’m proposing _—’_

\--

_大神_ _; ōgami, meaning god_

 _士郎 ; shir_ _ō, characters meaning samurai and man/men’s respectively; homonym for 白狼 ; white wolf_

_\--_

michiru is all curves and no edges. she has a strong sense of justice and and even stronger tendency to jump to false conclusions. but in the end, her heart is always right.

it’s hard for shirou to believe that she’s a human, and it’s a bit strange to think that he doesn’t even care, not all that much. he can put up with her. 

she gets mad whenever he mentions his hatred for humans. _‘doesn’t that make you just as bad as us?’_

_no, it doesn’t,_ he wants to yell, but in the case of himself he knows she is right. there is no high ground for him to take here, and despite michiru’s astounding tendency to draw lines between beastmen and humans that don’t exist she’s kind, and she always knows what’s right in the end.

god, does she get on his nerves.

(he doesn’t even mind.)

* * *

A BEASTMAN TERMINATION FACTOR??????

  
ARE YOU HIGH??? I’VE SPENT MY WHOLE ASS LIFE BEING A BEASTMAN AND SEEING PEOPLE PERSECUTED FOR IT. WHY SHOULD _WE_ YIELD TO YOU? WHY SHOULD WE STOP BEING WHO WE ARE JUST BECAUSE _YOU_ SAY WE SHOULDN’T? 

WHY DO PEOPLE INSIST ON SIDING WITH PEOPLE LIKE YOU WHEN, FOR ALL OF HISTORY, PEOPLE LIKE YOU HAVE DONE NOTHING BUT KILL ! NOTHING BUT KILL AND PERSECUTE AND I DON’T KNOW HOW HARD IT IS FOR YOU TO UNDERSTAND THIS BUT FOR YOU PEOPLE TO RULE US LIKE THIS… IT’S NOT FAIR! HOW DO I EXPLAIN IT’S NOT FAIR? 

HOW DO YOU EXPLAIN SOMETHING LIKE THAT? HOW DO YOU EXPLAIN PERSECUTION AND DEATH AND THE RUINING OF LIVES NOT AS LIFE’S EVENTS, BUT AS LIFE ITSELF? HOW DO YOU EXPLAIN HAVING LIVED THROUGH IT? THE CYCLE OF IT? THE NEVER-ENDING, CONSTANT SEPARATIONS THAT HAVE TO EXIST. WHY?

AND NOW THIS MAN THINKS HE CAN COME IN AND ACT SUPERIOR. ACT LIKE THE KNOWLEDGEABLE, KIND, CALM, COLLECTED _HUMAN_ WHO WILL SAVE US ALL.

  
WELL, THANK YOU, GREAT SAVIOR, BUT NO THANKS.

I AM GOING TO SAVE MYSELF.

WE ARE GOD.

* * *

‘if a nirvasyl syndrome outbreak happens before then, then using the vaccine will be unavoidable.’

‘thats—’

and rose _looks_ at him, with an expression in her eyes that says everything, that screams _i don’t want to do this, please don’t make this hard on me shirou_ and laughs _i can’t believe it’s come to this_ and whispers _i love this city._ and shirou stops.

‘alright,’ he says. ‘do what you must in your own way.’

and at last, lycurgus jumps into the sea. 

**Author's Note:**

> im so tired i dont care about this fic anymore so know that this is not my best work or at least like most of it isnt 
> 
> here are some of my beginner notes 
> 
> The year is 1056 and shirou ogami wants to die.  
> The king lycurgus of thrace banished the cult of dionysus and drove them out; in some variations he imprisoned his mother, andromeda. For his sins, the god dionysus drove him insane and he mistook his son for a mature trunk of ivy and pruned him ‘till he died  
> lycurgus is derived from greek lykos meaning wolf and ergos meaning work or deed  
> mental entropy ← stress  
> After he killed all the generals and stuff it was 76. he wandered into china some time later  
> A little girl beastman somewhere in china ‘i don’t want to die!’  
> Ogami is so stunted because he was twenty when he died and lived and spent the next millenia on destruction and grief  
> legends of a wolf hell-bent on revenge, only changed when he got to japan and idk what would be a life-changing activity uuh uh lets say formed a parasocial relationship with a family  
> rise of modern propaganda  
> Lycurgus jumps into the sea  
> drowning after first slaughter
> 
> IDEAS FOR GETUP:  
> trench coat: he liked it  
> Black shirt: good for sneaking  
> Collar: his wolf form without the collar is ginrou  
> Gloves:  
> He sees blood  
> He burned himself
> 
> WHY SHIROU IS SO PREJUDICED AGAINST HUMANS:  
> the ‘white people will always be racist’ syndrome except nobody deconditions themselves so OF COURSE hes angry  
> Continually no human has done anything nice to him after realizing he’s a beastman and they’ve also been murdering people like his entire life it’s not just one trauma and even if it was i think it’s still justified
> 
> THE TRUTH OF NIRVASIL SYNDROME:  
> It’s not caused by stress, it’s caused by cult activity from boris’s group, who’s also the same reason shirou turned into ginrou  
> #cultskill  
> ‘Mental entropy’ and ‘beastman instincts’ are just racist rhetoric. And the humans saw the infighting as a chance to take nirvasil 
> 
> in case it wasnt obvious im a leftist and i dont like bna very much. https://blacklivesmatter.carrd.co/ help out if you can


End file.
